On Remembrance Day, one Waterloo neighbourhood found itself inundated with hand-delivered pro-Nazi messages.
Jenny Dietrich’s 10-year-old son discovered a letter on their family’s front porch, and brought it inside.
“We opened it up and it was basically some Nazi propaganda,” she tells CTV News.
The letters, which were left at a number of homes on Munich Circle in Waterloo’s Laurelwood neighbourhood, were in envelopes.
On the envelopes were the words ‘They were called the allies because they were all lies.’
Inside the envelopes were photos of Adolf Hitler and other Nazis with various minority groups, and the phrase ‘True aryans have never thrown stones at coloured people.’
“I thought it was very inappropriate, on Remembrance Day, to go around to peoples’ homes and drop off these flyers,” says Dietrich, who threw her letter in the garbage.
Lissa Kuzych also discovered a flyer left at her door.
Like many of her neighbours, she was angered by the delivery – particularly because of the day it was made.
“I think they would be shocked at any time, but on Remembrance Day (it’s) horrible – and on a particularly significant Remembrance Day, it’s worse,” she says.
James Skidmore, a professor of German studies at the University of Waterloo, calls the letters “despicable,” and says they’re likely the work of someone with “a kind of irrational understanding of history.”
He says the letters aren’t indicative of any sort of rise in anti-Semitism or white supremacy factions.
“Most Germans today would abhor anything like this. They would despise that kind of hate literature,” he says.
Tuesday afternoon, Waterloo Regional Police said they had not heard from anyone who received the letters, but hoped they would get in touch.
“It could be viewed as a hate crime,” said Staff Sgt. Michael Haffner, adding that police would have to formally investigating before making any such decisions.
